


Catalyst

by EWGrant



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe - Student/Teacher, M/M, Rating May Change, Student!Lock, Teacher!John, Unilock, probably smut
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-04-20
Updated: 2014-06-03
Packaged: 2018-01-20 04:02:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 15,784
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1495894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EWGrant/pseuds/EWGrant
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first time John meets Sherlock Holmes is in a bar - charming, enigmatic and a total mystery. The second time John meets Sherlock Holmes is in his lecture theatre, staring right at him from the middle row.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Sherlock Holmes

I’m not one for approaching random men in pubs - or anywhere, for the record; I’m not… _Into_ men like that - but I couldn’t keep my eyes off him. He was nursing a bourbon at the bar of my local; it was a slow Wednesday night and I just couldn’t sit in that dingy flat of mine any longer. I thought I’d come for a pint or two and maybe even six, then stagger home and regret it the next morning.

I said hello to a few of the regulars, but I never really stopped for conversation with any of them. I was quite young compared to the men who spent their mornings, afternoons and evenings here. I think that’s why he caught my eye - he seemed only slightly younger than me, but The Vine wasn’t exactly the most exciting form of nightlife in London, which is precisely why it tended not to attract punters under forty.

I skulked to the bar and helped myself to one of the barstools, getting myself a pint and fiddling with the beer mat. I could have called Stamford, or Lestrade, or one of the boys from work but all in all I just really didn’t feel like seeing any of them. With them, it was always “oh, me and the wife did this…” or “yeah, took the kids out here…” and I couldn’t stand hearing how their lives were progressing normally and healthily and I was still stuck in the job I never truly wanted, in a tiny, barely affordable flat in London.

Maybe that’s why I allowed myself to be so intrigued by him. I was sick of the same, inane people and here was someone who mirrored my scowl exactly and maybe had one or two things to say about the state of his life. I liked to have somebody to complain with.

I couldn’t even deny that I was pleased when he slid across the bar and onto the stool beside me, ordering another drink even though the tumbler in his hand was still full. I couldn’t stop looking at his smooth, alabaster skin and his long fingers wrapped around the glass; his face framed by unruly, dark curls that looked stark against his complexion. He looked young, but he was dressed impeccably in a sharp suit with a deep purple shirt, top button undone, long coat and scarf draped over his lap. He was like nothing I’d ever seen around here before.

What startled and eventually came to amuse me was that he began our conversation without greeting or preamble: “We are quite alike, you and I.” His voice was deep and rumbled through me,  touching my bones and my organs and all the little cells between. I raised my eyebrows and tried to find my own voice.

“How so?” I ventured, intrigued. “You don’t know anything about me.”

“I know you are unhappy with your home life, as you are in this frankly _dreary_ public house on a Wednesday evening when most men your age are settled in front of the television with their significant other and their children tucked up in bed,” he rattled off, barely taking a breath as my eyes widened and my head buzzed. It definitely couldn’t have been the few sips I’d had of my pint. “I know you aren’t looking forward to work tomorrow because it isn’t the career path you wanted to choose for yourself. I know you live alone and can barely afford to live in London and pay the rent, let alone settle down and start a family. I know you are lonely. You have friends but you don’t want to call them because you feel inferior to them because your life is going nowhere. I also know you have hideous taste in jumpers.” With that, he knocked back what was in his tumbler and occupied his hands with the new glass, knocking the empty one forwards with his knuckles.

I was gobsmacked. Had I been talking aloud? Was I on some weird version of _This is Your Life_? “How… What… That was… Amazing.”

His eyebrows raised slightly and he regarded me from the corner of his eye. “Really?”

I nodded firmly. “Absolutely… Amazing. Brilliant, in fact.”

“Hmm. That’s not what people usually say.”

“What do people usually say?”

“Piss off.”

I laughed loudly, feeling it vibrate in my belly. I hadn’t laughed properly in a while; it felt foreign. Who was this man?

“How did you guess all that?”

He snorted. “I don’t _guess_ anything.”

“Then… How did you know? Have we met before?”

The side of his mouth twitched in a sort of smile. “That’s the thing with you people - you see, but you do not observe. Really, it is easy to know anything about anybody if you just _observe_ what’s right there in plain view.”

I was fairly sure this man was insane, but at the same time there was a certain charm about him: the way he held himself, his voice was like baritone silk and everything about him invited you in. Suddenly, I didn’t care that I had a crap flat and a crap job and a crap social life. I also didn’t care that he knew I had all those things.

“Who are you?” I rested my chin on the heel of my hand, taking a long gulp of my drink. He altered his position at the bar ever so slightly to face me.

“Sherlock Holmes,” he said simply. 

“Sherlock,” I repeated, testing it on my tongue, tasting it in my mouth. I nodded. “John,” I responded, feeling like even my name was inadequate for someone so interesting and enigmatic. I held my hand out awkwardly for him to shake. He eyed it, raising an eyebrow, before clasping it in his own and shaking firmly. I scratched out the mental note of how soft his hands were. 

“It’s a pleasure, John,” he said, downing his other drink and then looking down into the glass, swirling the ice cubes around as they melted under the heat of his hands. “At the risk of sounding as though I belong in a tedious American film, do you come here often?”

I couldn’t help the grin on my face. “Can’t you just… _Deduce_ that from me?”

He smirked. “Ordinary people tend to stray away from stating facts about people they just met. I am heeding that advice for the moment.”

“Yeah, I come here… You know, sometimes. When I don’t have a lot on.” More like every other night. He nodded tightly. Obviously, the bastard _knew_. “What brings you here, anyway? I recall you saying this place was dreary. Which would be a correct assumption.”

“Assumptions are dangerous, John. One should never make assumptions,” he muttered as he turned to the barman, signalling for two more drinks. He slid one of the glasses over to me without explanation. For some reason I took it and knocked it right back without a word. “I never run into anybody I know here.”

“Ah. So, don’t you… I don’t know, have a… Girlfriend? Or… something?” My mouth was suddenly dry. Why was I even interested? I couldn’t stop looking at his mouth. Was that rocket fuel I just drank?

He frowned over the top of his glass. He swallowed before answering and the wet gulp made my palms sweat. “No, not really my area.”

I felt a wave of relief wash over me for some reason. Were they spiking drinks here now or something? I certainly felt less than sober and even less coherent. “A boyfriend, then? Which is fine, by the way.”

He looked at me sharply. “I know it’s fine,” he said coolly.

I didn’t press it further. So girls weren’t his area, but were boys? Wait, what did it matter? It didn’t matter. I didn’t care. I drained my pint and it left a significantly less satisfying feeling in my mouth than the bourbon did. My mind suddenly wandered to Sherlock’s mouth and how the taste of bourbon was probably still lingering there after he took his last mouthful. I couldn’t stop watching his plump bottom lip over the rim of his glass. He caught me staring.

“I don’t have to ask to know you are unattached,” he muttered, his voice lower than earlier. I swallowed and laughed shakily, my eyes flitting up to catch his gaze. He maintained eye contact as he dipped two of his slender fingers into his tumbler, fishing out an ice cube, which he slowly and deliberately put into his mouth, letting it melt on his tongue. I could smell the alcohol radiating off his short breaths. I groaned lightly, too entranced by his mouth to be embarrassed. My hands were gripping my knees so tightly, my knuckles were turning white.

When it had melted fully, he swallowed the ice-water-and-bourbon mix, licking his lips with a small smirk. In a swift, graceful move, he slid off the barstool, coat and scarf in hand, before leaning forward to lower his mouth to my ear. “Bathroom.” He strolled away casually, disappearing behind the men’s toilet door.

I closed my gaping mouth and sat up straight, eyes darting around the pub. No one was staring, as I had first thought. Nobody here _cared_. Half the punters were passed out drunk by four in the afternoon. A quick glance at my watch told me it was nearing midnight. Where had that time gone? I was suddenly disoriented, my head buzzing with his insane madman and his bourbon breath and his eyes of indescribable colour and dark hair on pale skin. Who just told me to meet him in the bathroom. _You’re not even gay,_ I reminded myself. Because I wasn’t. I’m not.

Nonetheless, I trailed after him to the loos, trying to stop myself from practically sprinting. I pushed open the door, eyes darting around for him and before the door had even swung shut behind me, I was grabbed by the coat and dragged into one of the cubicles. 

He pushed me against the door and reached behind me to slide the lock in place, resting his hands either side of my head and caging me in. We just looked at each other, him out-sizing me in terms of height, heart pounding so loudly I swear even the drunkards passed out in the gutter outside could hear it.

He leaned forward and I swallowed thickly. His lips grazed the shell of my ear and his short puffs of breath made my skin tingle. He breathed in - _smelling_ me? - before running his tongue down my ear and catching the lobe between his teeth. My breath hitched. What the fuck was I doing?

He stopped and pulled back to look at my face. “You don’t do this much, do you?” he whispered and his husky voice tap-danced right down to my crotch. Ugh, God.

“I’m not gay,” I managed to stutter out as he planted kisses right down my neck, pausing at the pulse point near my collarbone. I cried out lamely as he bit down and simultaneously pressed himself flush against me. 

“Are you sure?” I could feel his smirk against my skin. I wanted to clarify that _yes_ I was bloody sure and that the only reason him sucking the life out of my neck felt _so fucking good_ was that I wasn’t entirely sober and my brain was probably imagining he was a woman. Because I was _not gay_.

He parted my legs slightly with his own, slipping his thigh ever so slightly between them, just nudging the inconvenient swelling that was happening in my pants. Fuck, stop this now. “I’m not gay,” I said again, a little more firmly than last time, which caused him to stop nibbling the skin at my neck and pull back.

“Neither am I, but look at us both,” he drew back fully, stepping away from me and I tried to ignore the flutter of disappointment in the pit of my stomach. He reached forward and pulled the collar of my jumper up ever so slightly, covering the bruising patch of skin he had just been attacking. “See you around, John.” He reached behind me and unlocked the door, slipping out of the bathroom before my brain had a chance to catch up.

I waited a minute or two before leaving the toilets, in the hopes that people would just assume we had both gone to the bathroom at the same time. There was no sign of Sherlock in the main room and the glasses were cleared from the bar. It’s like I’d made him up.

I decided to walk the fifteen minutes back to my flat; I couldn’t face the idle talk with the cabbie when my mind was so full of… God knows what. I stuck the key in the lock and let myself inside, re-locking it and chucking my keys at the precariously stacked pile of marking I had to do on the counter. 

Changing into my pyjamas, I crawled into bed and stared up at my ceiling. “Sherlock Holmes,” I whispered, projecting his name into the cosmos. “Sherlock,” the name felt right on my tongue. He was a complete mystery, yet everything was an open book to him. He knew so much yet I knew so little. I felt like I was ten steps behind him. I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to sleep. I knew I’d have a hangover for work in the morning, but it had nothing to do with the piteous amount of alcohol I had consumed.

Sherlock Holmes. His name flashed behind my eyelids in a myriad of psychedelic colours before sleep finally consumed me.


	2. Doctor Watson

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He was completely and utterly amused. Why wasn’t he positively blushing at the fact he’d tried to seduce his university lecturer in the men’s toilets only a few days earlier?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Follow me on my fic Twitter for updates and things, or maybe even just a chat: @EWGrantAo3. Let me know you're from here and I'll follow ya back.

I couldn’t stop thinking about Sherlock Holmes. 

I went back to The Vine at the same time the next evening, half-hoping that he would have had the same idea and would be waiting for me. I sat and had two pints then went home with a deflated feeling in my stomach.

I went back again on the Friday night, had one drink and walked home, clenching my fists at my sides in frustration. Why was I so obsessed with a man that didn’t even know my second name, nor did he venture to know?

I didn’t even step through the door Saturday night before seeing that he wasn’t there and hopping straight back in the taxi that I’d arrived in. 

I had sulked at work for two days and I sulked in my flat for the entire weekend. Something about him had imprinted on me and I couldn’t shake it. He was extraordinary, there was no denying it: what kind of man could deduce someone’s entire life story within minutes, just from _looking_ at them? I wanted to see him again; I wanted to delve inside the mind of the madman and find out just what made him tick and how he could see - no, _observe_ the most incredible and particular things.

I thought back to my own class at the university - bright, intelligent students with heaps of potential, yet not a single one would ever grow to be like Sherlock Holmes. I had known him all of a few hours and I saw him in every student I taught, every colleague I spoke to and every paper I marked. 

I thought about those God awful vampire books that Mary from work had convinced me to read and wondered whether Sherlock was really a vampire that could read minds. Or maybe he could use his weird vampire powers to make me fawn over him. I wondered if he glittered in the sun. Good job I wasn’t… You know, _into_ men. 

I split my pile of marking into two, just so that I’d have something to occupy myself all weekend. The rent was due in a few days, so I couldn’t afford to be sitting in pubs for hours waiting for a complete stranger to stop by on the off-chance.

I sat down on Sunday evening to finish grading my papers, with a cuppa and Eastenders on the telly as background noise. We were only a couple of weeks into the new term and I was steadily impressed by the first years’ quality of work. Nothing satisfied me more than a good analysis of the cells of the nervous system.

It only took me an hour or so - my marking was always more efficient when I was avoiding other things - and I felt lighter than I had done since Wednesday night after knowing that my lectures had obviously sunk in with the majority of my students. I was a simple man of fairly simple pleasures and it was nice to just feel like my crappy job was worthwhile sometimes.

I showered and settled into bed relatively early, fatigued from my chaotic and erratic worrying over Sherlock Holmes. I told myself to grow up and leave it - I was a thirty five year old man, for crying out loud. So, a random man happened to guess I was bored of my job and flat. There really was no miracle in that - hell, you could probably see it clear as anything in my face. I made little effort to disguise my distaste for my current career situation. Why had I been so mesmerised when he was sat in front of me? Now I felt silly. He was just a nosy, arrogant prick that I was all too ready to forget about. With a firm and settled huff, I snapped my eyes shut and fell asleep within the hour.

Monday morning was dreary, made worse by the smog of London’s streets. The sky was grey but the air was ever so slightly warm, hinting that there might be a massive shift later. I dressed in a plain white shirt, popping my favourite oatmeal-coloured jumper over the top for good measure. I was determined to start the week with a positive attitude and, frankly, I felt like I could take on the world in this jumper. It really was just a nice jumper.

Packing my papers and lecture plan into my briefcase, I ventured out and briskly walked the ten minute journey to the tube station. It pulled up bang on time and I slipped into the end car with ease, finding a seat straight away, even though it was peak time on a Monday morning. By the time I got off and made my way overground, the sun had broken through the clouds just so and I found myself almost whistling the entire way to the campus.

I nodded a greeting to those in the staff room and grabbed a quick cup of coffee, narrowly missing bumping right into Mary in the hallway, stuffing an apology in her face and half-skipping to my lecture theatre to set up. I was just fiddling with my USB in the side of the laptop, trying to pull up my presentation on motor neurons when I heard a few students enter the theatre. There was always a handful of the eager ones who liked to grab their favourite seat right at the front. It was endearing, really; I found myself wondering why I had never had such enthusiasm when I was at university.

I finally sorted out my technological issues and straightened up, pulling the creases back out of my sweater and turning around in order to flick on the main projector with my remote. My eyes casually roamed the room, only mildly interested in who was chatting quietly in the front row to the right, when my gaze fell on a someone sat slap bang in the middle of the block, right in front of me, staring at me with the same surprise and perhaps curiosity as I imagined I was glaring at him. I was pulled out of my reverie when the projector control fell out of my slack grip and clattered to the floor, causing the girls to my right to stop talking. I offered them a weak, sheepish smile in apology and bent to pick up the remote, my head racing ten to the dozen.

Surely, it couldn’t be him? Surely? I was too scared to even let my eyes dart up to get another look. I wanted to laugh at myself. I wanted to laugh at the irony of all of it. Days and nights spent hoping that I’d manage to run into him again, just to gain _some_ understanding of the madman that had relayed my life story to me in a dingy pub in London. All to no avail, yet here he was - at least, I _thought_ it was him - sitting in my lecture theatre, smug smile almost burning a hole through the back of my oatmeal jumper.

I couldn’t face him, so I turned my back to the hall, pretending to adjust things on my lecture notes. Oh, I missed a full stop there. Must add that. Wow, that entire card is completely illegible. Best keep my hands and brain busy by writing that one out again.

I felt a presence at my side. I knew it was him. I didn’t even have to look up. He cleared his throat and I straightened stiffly, turning my head slightly in his direction. His face was passive but there was something wicked in his eyes. He was completely and utterly amused. Why wasn’t he positively _blushing_ at the fact he’d tried to seduce his university lecturer in the men’s toilets only a few days earlier?

“Well, even I didn’t expect us to meet quite under these circumstances,” he muttered pleasantly. I couldn’t help but wonder whether he’d expected us to meet again at all.

“Why are you here?” I asked bluntly. 

I saw him roll his eyes out of my peripherals. “Evidently, I am here for my lecture. I would ask you the same question, however I have little time for pointless, illogical questions.”

“You didn’t… You never said you were so… A _student_ ,” I practically hissed, glancing over my shoulder self-consciously. God, this was so bad. So, so bad.

“You didn’t ask,” he said simply, like that was the most obvious thing in the world. “I suppose, in retrospect, perhaps I should have given you more time to do so, before I enticed you to join me in the bathroom.”

“Whoa!” I protested a little too loudly, turning to face him properly and lowering my voice again. “You can not talk about that here. Got it? And you didn’t _entice_ me anywhere. I’m not gay.”

The corner of his mouth twitched in amusement. “I wouldn’t have pinned you down for a university professor. Suppose it was quite obvious, really, thinking about it now.”

I pinched the bridge of my nose between my thumb and forefinger. “What did you pin me down for, then?” I asked flatly. I couldn’t help my curiosity, before instantly regretting my choice of words.

His eyebrows waggled almost imperceptibly. I chose to look away. “I’d have said medical practitioner, you’ve got a steady hand, so perhaps a surgeon. There’s something in your stance that screams military, so I may have even ventured for army doctor. But now I see those may just be long-distant dreams and aspirations. You’re certainly not living up to your full potential here, Doctor _Watson_ ,” he trailed his finger over the surname printed on my staff ID card, hanging from a lanyard around my neck. 

“Amazing,” I muttered begrudgingly. He really was _good_.

“So I was right.” It wasn’t a question.

“I was a doctor. Not a surgeon, no; just a GP in a little clinic near where I used to live. The place shut down and I was made redundant. I’ve always wanted to be a military doctor. Did the tests and the training, then my sister…” I trailed off. This wasn’t confession time or some bullshit therapy circle. “Anyway, plans changed and I ended up doing a teaching degree and, well, here I am.” My arms flapped at my sides uselessly.

He nodded. “You’ve achieved quite a lot in your short years, haven’t you, John?” He sounded impressed. Pride swelled somewhere inside me like a balloon before I stabbed it to death with an internal pin. “You can’t be over thirty five.”

“Bang on, actually,” I almost smiled. My eyes flickered over his shoulder to the suddenly rather full lecture theatre and I cleared my throat, taking a step back from him for good measure. “Yes, well, very good. If you’d like to take your seat, Mr. Holmes, then I’d like to begin.”

Flashing one last smirk in my direction, he surprised me by obliging and settling in his chosen seat; the middle seat of the middle row of the central block, right at eye level, so no matter where I stood I was faced with a pair of verdigris orbs tracking my every move. Suddenly motor neurons became more difficult to talk about.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I actually really hate this chapter. Sorry, they'll get better - time-passing is not my forte.  
> Also, I know John is pretty young to have done all the stuff he's done in his life, but let's just assume he's really clever and his smooshy face and cable knit jumpers got him far in life, okay? Just roll with it. Just breathe.


	3. Mary Morstan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock bloody Holmes wasn’t going to make me run off with my tail between my legs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> These chapters always seem longer when I write them on Pages. Sorry.

It shouldn’t have surprised me that he was utterly brilliant. I loathed presenting lectures where I just talked and talked at my students, so I tried to engage them as much as possible without putting them on the spot. It was difficult to get a response sometimes, especially with the self-conscious first years. Naturally, Sherlock answered every single question I posed in his usual almost-bored drawl. It was like I was telling an old joke, the punchline of which he’d heard a thousand times before. He made my palms sweat and I suddenly felt a little less confident.

I was glad when the lecture was over and apparently the other students were too, as they rushed to grab their things and leave, shooting glances and whispers in Sherlock’s direction. I caught a snippet of one conversation and heard the word “freak” bobbing around the room. It made me frown unconsciously.

I packed my resources away and wondered whether he would stay behind to torment me further. He made no move to and when I turned around, he was halfway up the stairs towards the exit at the back of the hall. “Sherlock?” I called before I could stop myself. I deserved a punch right in the face. He stopped and paused for a moment, before turning incrementally in my direction. He raised his eyebrows expectantly. “Ah, how are you finding the material?” I stuttered lamely. Of course he was coping with it. Hell, he could probably teach it better than I could.

“Trite and uninteresting,” he replied bluntly and I almost laughed. “However, your teaching method is fastidious.”

“Er… Thanks?” I scrubbed the back of my neck awkwardly. How did he make something that was probably intended to be a compliment sound like an accusation? “If it’s so boring, why are you here? Why did you join so late?” 

“Which do you want me to answer?” I looked at him blankly. “Do you want to know why I’m here, or why I was a late arrival?”

“Uh… Both?”

He rolled his eyes. Was I really that annoying? How could someone evidently so much _younger_ than me make me feel so minute? “Even intelligent people get bored. I, in particular, get very, very bored.”

“So you just thought, ‘Oh, I know, I’ll take a biomedical sciences degree’?” 

He smirked then. “Fills the time when there are no interesting murders happening, I suppose.” I didn’t even want to know what he meant by that. Nonetheless, I blanched. He laughed properly for the first time in my presence. It was a nice sound. “Is that all you require from me, _sir_?” 

I swallowed thickly. God, what was he doing, looking at me like that? God, why were my hands sweating? I must be hungry. I glanced at my watch desperately and internally debated whether 11am was too early to take an extended lunch break. I only looked up again when I heard the door swing shut and Sherlock Holmes had once again vanished with nothing but a swish of his expensive coat.

//

“John?” I suddenly refocused my eyes and found Mary clicking her fingers in front of me, amusement on her face. “Thought I’d lost you there, for a second. Tough morning?” I looked down at my hands and saw my sandwich, untouched, where I’d paused and spaced out halfway towards my mouth. I laughed weakly.

“Ready for a half term, I think.” I took a bite when my stomach grumbled again. I’d managed to force myself to wait until an acceptable lunchtime before stalking to the staff room, praying to God that he wouldn’t jump out and push me against some lockers or something.

Mary barked out a laugh. I always liked that she made me out to be funnier than I was. “We’re only a few weeks in! Get it together, Watson.” She spooned some of her soup into her mouth, her eyes twinkling. I had always liked Mary. If I wasn’t such a bumbling idiot, I’d have probably asked her out.

Mary Morstan was pretty with short, blonde hair that she tucked behind her ears. Her eyes always sparkled like she knew something you didn’t. She never stopped smiling and she made everybody feel good. She had been the first person I’d met two years earlier, when I’d come to the university to see if I could get some teaching experience. She never questioned why I’d lost my job at the surgery and supported the idea that I’d come to teach. She’d helped me whenever I needed it. She was the kind of nice that you didn’t think really existed.

“I know, I know,” I snorted, feeling more relaxed. I had no idea why I was so het up about a smarmy, know-it-all teenager. “Had a latecomer join my lecture today. I didn’t know they accepted people this far into term.”

“Oh, that Holmes boy? Yeah, his big brother’s some hot-shot apparently, high up in some kind of agency or other,” she replied, waving her hands vaguely. I couldn’t help smiling at her useless information. “Weird bunch, that Holmes family.”

I shrugged, hoping I appeared nonchalant. “Never heard of them. He’s a cocky git, that’s all I know.”

Mary grinned. “Might make for some interesting teaching.”

“Oh, sure,” I smiled tightly. ‘Interesting’ in the way that every time I caught his gaze, I imagined him pressing me up against the cubicle of the men’s loo. I shook my head and focused on Mary, beautiful Mary. Beautiful? Yes, I suppose she was beautiful. I was about to open my mouth to invite her for a drink - I needed to stop moping about a boy over ten years my junior - when she stood up and cleared her bowl and spoon from the table. 

“I’d better go and set up this practical,” she rolled her eyes and I ignored the tiny bit of disappointment in my belly. “Bloody kids need constant safeguarding. Who knew a nineteen year old could still manage to half chop off a finger with a bloody scalpel?”

I laughed genuinely. “Nobody who goes on the piss as much as these kids should ever handle a scalpel.”

She grinned again with one eye closed in a cute kind of wink. She squeezed my shoulder as she passed to dump her bowl in the sink. “Later, Watson.” 

//

The rest of the teaching day passed without a hiccup and I felt myself starting to relax back into my weekly routine. I had a habit of letting myself become too distressed and angry about things that disrupted my rhythm; Stamford constantly suggested some kind of hypnotherapy to chill me out. I preferred to just clench my fists at my sides and hope to God that I didn’t punch anybody.

I had two small seminars in the afternoon, only made up of about twelve students each, then I decided to stay a little later to finalise my teaching plans for the rest of the week. It wasn’t unusual for me to be the last person in the building at night, even after the cleaners went home. They always left the key to the back entrance on my desk and trusted me to return it the next morning. The one thing I really liked about my job was the no-questions-asked policy that everybody seemed to adopt.

I scrawled notes over my lecture plans and paused to think, balancing my pen between my teeth and flipping open my laptop. Mid-Google search, the computer bleeped so loudly it echoed around the empty room and made me jump. I frowned and squinted, clicking the prompt that read _[1 new mail]._  

Up popped an email from a contact that I didn’t have saved. Usually, it was students emailing late at night with queries about an assignment due the next day. I could hardly criticise them, as I’d done the exact same thing during my time at university. I opened the email nonetheless.

_How’s your neck? SH_

I frowned harder, tensing every muscle in my forehead. My neck? Lamely, I tried to inspect my neck by widening my mouth and lowering my chin. I looked like an idiot, but what did it matter? What a confusing email. Who was ‘SH’? I was about to delete and ignore the message when it all made sense, clicking together in my head like those first two pieces of a jigsaw. ‘SH’ for Sherlock Holmes. It had to be.

_What do you mean?_

I hit reply before I even considered the implications of the message. It was so easy to forget that my work emails were monitored. Not that anybody had reason to be snooping around my inbox and outbox, but if they were to do a random inspection… 

A reply came almost instantly. _You probably don’t want me to divulge that information to the rest of the faculty. SH_

I laughed humourlessly. I still hadn’t got a baldy clue what he was— Oh, shit. I hooked my finger around the collar of my jumper gingerly and pulled it back an inch or two, revealing a mostly faded bruise on my neck, the perfect fit for the mouth of a certain cocky student of mine. I flushed at the memory.

_Fine. Did you need something?_

_Why would I need anything from you? SH_

I sighed. S _ee you tomorrow, Sherlock._

Suddenly too rattled to carry on with the work I’d intended to do, I packed my things away half-heartedly and grabbed the keys the cleaner had left for me, letting myself out the back and locking the shutters. I glanced at my watch and was satisfied that it was still early enough for me to get the tube home without fearing for my life.

I let the rocking of the underground carriage send me off into a daydream. I found myself wondering idly whether it would be suspicious if I transferred Sherlock to another tutor. But why should I let him disrupt me so much? The satisfaction he would get out of knowing he’d ruffled me would be too much to bear. I straightened my shoulders and lifted my chin unconsciously. Sherlock bloody Holmes wasn’t going to make me run off with my tail between my legs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Follow my fic twitter @EWGrantAo3 for updates and things. I decided to make Mary nice here, because I feel like I devote too much time to loathing her character. Thanks for your lovely comments and kudos so far. I didn't expect anybody to read!


	4. Intrigue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I don’t need friends, John. Alone is what I have. Alone protects me.”

A month or so passed and Sherlock Holmes barely interrupted my routine at all. Sometimes, it was like he wasn’t even present at my lectures; he kept his mouth shut and didn’t interject once, something I felt was completely uncharacteristic for the know-it-all madman.

If I was honest, the novelty of the relief I felt had worn off. At first, I’d been glad that he’d decided to let me get on with my job and my life and I didn’t have to worry about the implications of what we did - or what we _could_ have done - that night in the pub. In fact, I barely thought about it at all anymore.

But now, I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong. Sherlock Holmes seemed exactly the kind of boy to enjoy messing with peoples’ heads. A man that could practically read your every life move just from the suit you were wearing had some material to work with. His silence disturbed and concerned me.

That’s when I made the potentially foolish decision to strike up a conversation with him. I’d just wrapped up one of our seminars on an introduction to genetics when I noticed that he hadn’t even shifted from his seat, whilst every other student had already left the classroom. His eyes were glazed and distant and his fingers were steepled under his chin as though he was in deep thought. The sight almost made me smile.

“Penny for your thoughts?” I offered casually. It took a minute before his eyes flickered up to meet mine.

“I would assume that keeping that penny would be a wiser choice for you.”

“I thought it was dangerous to make assumptions,” I quoted his exact words and I think he smirked at me. I felt my shoulders relax slightly at his weak smile.

“That it is.” He stood and shrugged on his extravagant coat, pushing his left arm through the sleeve before his right. I was reluctant to see him leave.

“Are you… Okay? I mean, is there anything wrong? You’ve been… I don’t know, less brash, lately.”

He raised his eyebrows. “Perfectly fine.”

“If there’s anything I can help with… I’m here. I mean, you can talk to me. Email me. Whatever.”

A frown crossed his features but it was gone before I could properly register it. I thought I noted confusion in his eyes. “Why would you want to help me, John?”

I shrugged with a half smile. “Why not? That’s what friends do.”

He paused in looping his scarf around his neck. “I wasn’t aware that we were friends.”

I blanched. Now I looked like a complete idiot. “Well, we could be… I mean, it doesn’t seem as though you’re interested in any of your peers. Have you not got a group of mates to talk to?”

“I don’t need friends, John. Alone is what I have. Alone protects me.”

I frowned and sighed. “No. Friends protect people.”

I thought he was going to retaliate, but he swallowed my words silently and nodded a farewell to me before leaving the room wordlessly. 

His behaviour intrigued and distressed me. I went to bed that evening wondering what the hell had happened to the Sherlock Holmes I had met a month ago. I wanted to establish some kind of relationship with him - strictly professional - but he made it so difficult to do. It was like the man had never had any God damn friends.

My heart stuttered slightly as I thought about the possible truth behind those words. He did tend to rub people up the wrong way. I had never seen him around other students and he didn’t interact with any of his peers in lectures or seminars. He didn’t attend study groups in the library with anyone else. He was always either reclining on the sofas in the atrium, hands under his chin, deep in thought, or with his face pressed up to his phone and typing furiously. I longed to tap into that brain of his.

I knew it wasn’t something that I should allow myself to become distressed, or even obsessed with, but I had an innate tendency to be the caregiver. I knew Sherlock Holmes wasn’t the type to accept any kind of care.

He continued to hand in assignments which were all of an excellent standard, far beyond anyone else in my classes, yet it just seemed as though they lacked something. Fervour? Excitement? Interest? He was distracted and something about it was uncharacteristic. Going against my better judgements, I decided to implement that need to fix things that was so often a fault of mine.

I found him exactly where I knew I would find him in my free period - ignoring the fact that I had checked his timetable prior to me endeavouring to find him. He was huddled up in the campus library, hogging an entire table to himself, but there wasn’t a book in sight. Instead, he was crouched over and his face was scrunched up in deep thought.

I slid in the chair opposite him and he didn’t even flinch. I didn’t know how to break the ice - he made me ludicrously nervous - so I clasped my hands in front of me on the table, waiting for him to acknowledge my presence. I sat for about ten or fifteen minutes before his eyes flickered up and he registered that I was there.

A quick frown flitted across his face. “What do you want?”

I couldn’t help smiling at his bluntness. “I came to see how you are.”

“I’m fine, I’m always fine. Why wouldn’t I be fine?”

It wasn’t a real question, I was sure, but I continued nonetheless. “I told you: you’ve been… Different lately. Distracted.”

“Yes, John, there are other things that occupy my time than just your frankly quite dull lectures.”

“I thought you enjoyed my lectures?”

He snorted ungracefully. “I have never uttered those words to you and it would be dangerous to assume that I have ever expressed that sentiment.”

I grinned wider. “Then why do you continue to show up? Nobody is forcing you.”

“You intrigue me,” he answered honestly, drumming his fingers along his bottom lip in thought. I wondered how on Earth someone as ordinary as I could possibly interest someone like Sherlock Holmes. I wanted to probe him further, but perhaps the campus library was not the best place to do so.

There was a strange feeling in my gut that I just couldn’t shift whenever I was around Sherlock. At first, I thought I’d caught a bug and consulted all my medical journals, even the ones with the most obscure and uncommon symptoms, just to put a name to the weird things I was feeling. Even my own medical knowledge couldn’t diagnose me with a pure infatuation with one of my students. I probably needed psychiatric attention rather than a general practitioner. 

He was looking at me with his steely eyes and an unreadable expression and I felt my pulse quicken ever so slightly. I covered my wrist instinctively before laughing mentally at myself; even Sherlock Holmes couldn’t spot a raised pulse just by sight. (Upon second thought, I realised that that probably wouldn’t be such an outrageous thing to think.)

After what felt like an inappropriately lengthy silence, I ventured to speak again. “Well, you certainly intrigue me.”

I couldn’t tell if he smiled at that - a smile was something so seldom seen from him that it was almost unrecognisable when it happened. I felt better about myself if I categorised that expression as a smile and felt a small triumph at the idea that I could make Sherlock Holmes smile, even just a tiny bit. “Most things intrigue ordinary people. They have no idea what they are missing, what with only using their brains to half their potential.”

I lowered my voice. “Can we go out somewhere?”

He raised his eyebrows at me and I wanted to kick myself hard between the legs. “Wouldn’t that be in breach of our teacher-student relationship, Doctor Watson?”

“I want to know you.”

Standing swiftly and buttoning his blazer jacket, his eyes flickered down to me as he muttered a reply. “Baker Street, eight o’clock. I’ll be outside.” With no further explanation, he whipped off silently and left me wondering what the hell I was doing. Still, I couldn’t shake the anticipation of eight o’clock finally coming around and what the evening would entail. I was such an idiot.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As usual, thank you all for your kind words!


	5. Lonely

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “You’re different to the rest of them,” I observed.

I was already three quarters of the way to Baker Street by about five minutes to eight, which made me laugh because I don’t think I’d ever been so punctual for anything in my entire life. My mother used to joke with me when I was in high school, saying I was so incapable of getting myself up on time that one day I’d be late for my own funeral.

The cab pulled up outside a row of tall, adjoined buildings, all the windows identical to one another, except this particular section had its bottom-most floors occupied by a quaint little café - the shutters closed now - but with a pillar-box-red, scallop-edged sign above it reading “Speedy’s Café”. The street was quiet and peaceful and not at all like the less-than-tranquil estate that I lived on.

I clambered out of the taxi just as I saw the shiny black door to my left open, then close again within the same second. I paid the cabbie, shut the taxi door and turned around to come face-to-face with the boy that hadn’t stopped pestering my subconscious since I’d met him.

“Evening,” he nodded curtly, his hands buried in the pockets of his extravagant coat, eyes squinted and darting up and down the street. It wasn’t in the paranoid way that I was certainly feeling. God forbid anybody saw me here, with him of all people.

I nodded back, feeling nerves in my lower gut, but I blamed it purely on the risk I was taking by even being here. It certainly was not because of present company. We stood in an awkward silence for a minute or two before he sighed impatiently and gestured his head for me to follow him, before turning on his heel and disappearing behind the shiny black door, with “221B” in brass letters nailed to it. 

I followed without a word.

I had heard his footsteps on the staircase so I instinctively knew to follow him up, eyeing the bottom door with suspicion. I wondered if anybody lived there and if so, whether they knew I was coming and even more importantly, whether they knew Sherlock was my student and I was his teacher and this was altogether probably a very inappropriate house call.

I trudged upstairs nonetheless, feeling out of place and uncomfortable. I had no idea what I wanted to say to him now that I finally had him outside of his educational environment - I realised I knew nothing at all about Sherlock Holmes the student, less so about Sherlock Holmes the person.

I stepped into flat 221B and eyed my surroundings - it was traditionally furnished, two comfy chairs positioned by the fireplace (did he live with someone? Parents? Did he have a girlfriend after all?) and evidently Sherlock’s belongings strewn all over the place. I was both impressed and annoyed that he could afford a place like this while paying off his student loans, when I was in full-time employment and could barely cover the rent for the dingy flat I lived in. I laughed internally, as I probably would have offered this man a flat-share had we known each other under different circumstances.

He was stood by the fireplace, coat and blazer removed, eyeing me in an intrusive yet not altogether uncomfortable manner. He was deducing me, I assumed; trying to figure out what I’d eaten for my lunch by the fact I had odd socks on, or something equally as ridiculous. I stepped further into the sitting room and stood, looking like an ill-fitting piece of furniture.

“This is nice,” I gestured to the room. “Really nice. _Really nice_. How do you afford a place like this?”

“I know the landlady, she gave me a good deal on the flat because I… I did her a favour.” He smiled sheepishly, as though he’d said one word too many. I must have missed whatever he had accidentally divulged. I smiled back anyway. “There’s another room upstairs. I could talk the price down for you. Or, equally, there is an even cheaper room downstairs, but I wouldn’t recommend it. Mould, damp, dust…” He trailed off.

“I couldn’t afford either on my wage,” I snorted. “You got a secret underground business going on the side to pay for this place? Aren’t students meant to be skint?”

“I work. Freelance,” he waved his hand dismissively. That didn’t curb my piqued interest. I wanted to hit him for being so God damn interesting. He gestured towards one of the chairs by the fireplace, as he gracefully folded himself into the leather recliner opposite. All the furniture was mismatched but it gave the flat a familiar, homely feel. It was a stark opposite from the clinical and clean environment I’d probably have guessed Sherlock would live in.

“What do you do then? This freelance work,” I asked.

“It’s not an _official_ career,” he sneered the word ‘official’ like it was a ridiculous concept. “Tea?”

“Oh, yeah, please.”

He nodded over to the kitchen. “Me too. No sugar. Good milk’s got the red top.”

I stared at him blankly for a second before sighing and heaving myself up, shuffling to the kitchen. He invites me to his own house and gets me to make his sodding tea? I open and close several cupboards before finally finding the mugs and setting two on the side, flicking the kettle on to boil.

I opened the fridge and grabbed the milk with the red top. I frowned. “What did you mean by the good mi—“ I stopped abruptly as the other milk carton (with a green lid) started rattling of its own accord. I slammed the fridge shut immediately. “Doesn’t matter.”

I finished up the brews and walked back to the sitting room carefully, one mug in each hand. I handed one to him which he took and curled his long, pale fingers around, savouring the warmth. It wasn’t a particularly cold evening, but one couldn’t help but notice the lack of body fat Sherlock had, so it wasn’t a surprise that he felt the cold more than I did. I’d certainly let myself gain some extra body fat.

“So, this unofficial career. What is it you do?”

He rolled his eyes, as though he was annoyed that I kept asking, but I could tell that he was secretly pleased in my interest. This was obviously something he was passionate about. I hoped I could tap into some of this passion when it came to my lessons. “I’m a consulting detective. Only one in the world, actually, seeing as I made the profession up.”

“So, you’re a private eye, then? A private inspector?” I sipped my tea.

“I’m the one the police call on when they get way out of their depth. Which is always.”

I grinned at his arrogance. “You go out and consult on cases, then? What, like, murders and stuff?”

“On a good day there’s a murder or two, yes,” he grinned back, his eyes lighting. “I am working particularly hard on one lately. It isn’t often that I find myself stumped.” His expression changed and he looked at me as though he couldn’t believe he’d said those words aloud, let alone in my presence. I remained passive.

“Is that why you’re slacking on my assignments?” I half-teased. 

His eyes flickered up at me over his cup and he raised an eyebrow. “I would hardly say I was _slacking_ , John, in comparison to some of the imbeciles in that lecture theatre. You should hear some of the things they whisper when you are talking. Are all ordinary people so dreadfully boring?”

“You’re different to the rest of them,” I observed.

His eyes left mine and darted to his cup, as though there was something suddenly very interesting about his tea. He looked almost… Vulnerable. “Yes,” he said eventually. “I am aware.”

I suddenly felt very bad for reasons that I couldn’t quite place yet. I knew I’d figure it out and the guilt would consume me in the early hours of the morning. “Not in a bad way,” I amended. “I think you’re brilliant. You’re just not like them.”

“That’s not the first time you’ve called me brilliant.” There wasn’t any accusation or judgement in his words, he was simply just stating a fact. He didn’t even sound annoyed, which was a Sherlock Holmes rarity. There was something in his tone of voice which made me want to smile, but I pushed it back in case that was the wrong response. I found myself second-guessing my own natural instincts when he was around.

“Is it not?”

“You have the memory of a sieve. You called me brilliant on that evening we met. You meant it then and you mean it now. Why?” He leaned forward, placing his mug on the floor but he didn’t lean back. He leaned further in my direction, awaiting my answer. He wanted to see every inch of my face as I answered, deducing and observing every flicker of my features.

“I… I don’t know. You’re intelligent. Beyond anything I’ve ever seen. You’re different but that’s fine, because it’s what you do. You knew everything about me without even speaking to me. You’re the cleverest man I’ve ever met and I barely know you.”

He smiled then and it was a genuine smile, one that I have categorised and sorted into my mental filing cabinet of Sherlock’s Smiles ever since. There was no sarcasm or irony or annoyance or I-just-want-you-to-leave-so-I’m-gonna-smile. He just seemed pleased.

“Why are you here, John?” he asked suddenly, but his voice was soft.

I realised that I didn’t know. But I knew that I didn’t want to leave. “I don’t know,” I blurted honestly. “Please don’t tell me to go.”

“I’m not going to,” he said slowly, assessing me as he sat back in his chair. His eyes didn’t leave mine. I wondered how desperate I looked and sounded. “For some reason, your company contents me. But why is it that you should wish to jeopardise your role as a teacher by coming here tonight? Do you really treat your career with such nonchalance?”

I shook my head. “I don’t want to jeopardise anything. Like I said, I just want to know you.”

He paused for a long minute, pinching his bottom lip between his index finger and thumb. “Yes,” he concluded. “And I you.”

“Then we can be friends,” I smiled, my heart pounding.

“I can’t say I’ve ever had friends before, John, I’m not entirely sure how efficient I will be at fulfilling the role.” He stood up and walked over to the window, gazing out at the street and clasping his hands behind his back. I understood that distraction technique. He didn’t like talking about feelings just the same as me. 

“Just be yourself.”

At the sincerity and almost innocence of my words, he turned around and looked at me with the first confusion I’d probably ever seen in his eyes. I stood up instinctively, as I felt uncomfortable being beneath someone’s eye level. He stepped towards me.

“Are you lonely, John?”

I cleared my throat a few times, my own form of coping with being asked emotional questions. “Me? No, I’m not— No. I’m fine.” I nodded firmly as if to punctuate my point.

“You are. That’s okay, John, many people are lonely,” he looked down at his shirt, fiddling with one of the buttons. Seeing him look awkward felt so wrong - there was no one more put-together than Sherlock. “Don’t tell anyone, but I can get quite lonely, too.” His last words trailed off in a whisper and my face contorted slightly in pain. It hurt me that anyone could marginalise this brilliant boy. And I know that they did. I wasn’t _that_ much older; I knew exactly what boys and girls were like at that age. They didn’t understand him.

Before my brain could catch up with my body, I reached forward and placed my hand around the one that was fiddling with his button. He stopped moving his fingers, but didn’t shake me off. He looked up at me through his lashes. “You don’t have to be lonely anymore,” I replied in the same hushed tone, relishing the first skin-to-skin contact I had allowed myself since he’d crushed me against that toilet cubicle door. This time was different, though, because for some reason it didn’t feel wrong.

Anyway, friends can hold hands, right?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promise I won't dilly-dally around their relationship too much more, but you've got to realise their predicament. Also, John is vehemently NOT GAY. (Yeah, right.) Also, note: "skint" means short on money, if you didn't know. I have no idea if that's a British term in general or whether we just use it up here. I figured I should elaborate, lmao.


	6. Baker Street

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I thought you didn’t just drop everything for me,” he commented, sipping his coffee with a smirk on the side of his mouth.

Sherlock returned to his usual self for the most part, appearing to have solved whatever hitch it was with the case that had been distracting him so much.

I hadn’t seen him outside of our lessons since he’d invited me to Baker Street, but something had changed between us that made me feel nervous. I knew I had crossed a boundary, holding his hand like that. I had crossed several boundaries even agreeing to go to his house. It wasn’t until I was lay in bed the evening of my visit that I realised how inappropriate I had been.

Training to be a teacher, they never explicitly tell you not to engage in personal relationships with students. They expect it to be an unwritten rule; a sort of moral code. It was different teaching in a university than a high school - all the students were adults and they varied in age; some students doing degrees were older than I was.

But that was irrelevant - _you do not surpass your role as a teacher_. No matter how enigmatic and charming and downright arrogant your students are.

I felt guilty for allowing myself to see him that evening. I made a conscious effort to treat him in exactly the same way as I treated all my other students. I didn’t wait around to speak to him after lectures and seminars. I avoided entering the campus library at all costs. I needed to desensitise myself from the boy, before I did something I really regretted.

A week or so later, I decided I needed to get my act together. When payday came around and I paid off my rent and utility bills, I decided to invite Mary out for a drink. What did I have to lose? Single men my age were always asking women out. It was about time I did, seeing as I was interested in women and not men because I was not gay. (I constantly reassured myself that I had a platonic infatuation with Sherlock Holmes.)

“Am I special or what?” Mary joked, sliding onto the bar stool beside me, shockingly reminiscent of the night I met Sherlock. I’d purposely avoided The Vine for that reason and had taken Mary to a quiet kind of bar downtown. It was cosy and modern and the clientele weren’t inebriated to the point of unconsciousness. It was nice.

I smiled over the top of my glass. “What do you mean?”

“John Watson asking _me_ out for a drink. Didn’t think you even ventured out of that classroom of yours.” I knew she was joking, but the words stuck anyway. I decided to deal with them later.

“Thought you might be bored of slicing up lungs,” I shrugged and she grinned. She really was very pretty.

We talked about work and she told me about her cats - which, admittedly, I feigned interest in - and how the weather was supposed to be pretty mild at the weekend so she was thinking about taking her niece to the park, because her sister was coming to London for a few days. I got a text from Stamford offering me a way out if the date - was it a date? - ended up being a bust, but I ignored it.

“How did you get on with that Holmes lad, then?”

I was shaken from my reverie at the mention of his name. I tried to keep my cool and not sound overly interested. “The arrogant one? Yeah, fine, bit of a dick, but I suppose they all are at that age.”

Mary laughed and nodded in agreement, sipping her white wine. “I saw him the other day. I think he was looking for you.”

“What do you mean?” I frowned and took a long gulp of my drink, trying to keep my hands and mouth busy.

“I was running to grab a first aid kit and he was just wandering around the corridors, muttering to himself. Kept staring in through a classroom window. I think it was one of your lectures.” She was eyeing me with an unreadable expression.

“Bizarre,” I shrugged. “Probably wanted help with something.” Mary was surprisingly observant. If I wasn’t sick with worry about what she would read from the incident, I’d be impressed. 

She snorted. “Yeah, unlikely. He may be your student, but the rest of us aren’t strangers to the rumours going round about him. Is it true he just… Tells you your life story by looking at you?”

“Er, apparently so.”

“He’s never done it to you?”

I swallowed my beer hard and it sat funny in my stomach. “Not that I can recall.”

“You don’t want to talk about him, do you?”

I smiled weakly and didn’t reply.

//

Mary and I didn’t stay out too late as we were both teaching the next day, but it was the longest I’d spent outside the flat in someone else’s company in years. It felt nice having a social life. I wondered how I’d strayed so far from the way I was in university - out every night, massive group of friends. You didn’t earn the nickname “Three Campuses Watson” by sitting in all night. That nickname still made me simultaneously chuckle and cringe.

Monday morning rolled around all too quickly with a groan and a sigh and a few bashes at the snooze button on my alarm clock. I was surprised how quickly time had gone by; we were already fast approaching the beginning of November, and my reluctance to get out of the semi-warmth of my bed was growing stronger by the day.

I had also noticed a new damp patch appear on my ceiling. There was one in the bathroom that I’d been avoiding for months. I sighed heartily. I knew I needed a new place, but without getting a loan or even another job I’d never be able to afford somewhere new in London. The last thing I wanted was to reach out to my sister, Harry. I knew that would inevitably cause some further distance between us, as I’d have to attempt to deal with her sobriety issues - or, rather, lack of sobriety. 

Disgruntled by how quickly my flat was falling apart and the family disturbances that I kept burying in the sand, I threw on a shirt without bothering to shower and headed to the tube station. I was glad I only had a morning of short seminars today, which meant that I could skulk off to the café down the street and get some marking done without my leaky bathroom distracting me.

I set the students in my first seminar off on an individual research task, allowing them to work in pairs. At least if they had something to do, they wouldn’t want to talk to me. I only realised about ten minutes in that Sherlock was meant to attend this class but he hadn’t showed up. Technically, none of the classes were mandatory, but it was unlike him to just completely skip.

I wondered if he’d been dragged off on another case. I still couldn’t believe the police would be allowed to consult with a nineteen year old boy on grisly murders and other violent crimes. Was that even legal? I didn’t want to think about it.

About fifteen minutes in to the class, he made an appearance and slinked into the seat at the end of the big, circular desk, slightly away from the other students who were chatting in their pairs, taking no notice of the brilliant boy that had just entered the room.

“Why are you late?” I murmured, trying to put my teacher voice on whilst avoiding his eyes, shuffling my sheets in front of me.

“I had other things to do,” he dismissed. I wanted to probe him further, unable to quash my interest in his life, but I swallowed the urges down and cleared my throat to dispel them. “You look awful,” he added.

I ignored his comment. “A little warning would have been nice.” I slid one of the sheets over to him. “Research task. There’s laptops next door if you didn’t bring one.”

I saw him nod slowly out of my peripherals and carefully retrieve a laptop from his bag, which he set up on the desk and began typing furiously onto. 

I relaxed into my chair and closed my eyes, pinching the bridge of my nose between my forefinger and thumb. I allowed myself a second to internally stress about my living situation and how on earth I was going to afford the costs to repair my utterly crap flat.

I opened my eyes a minute later to find the classroom completely deserted except for Sherlock, still beside me, touch-typing as he eyed me with suspicion and… Concern?

“What— Where did everyone go?” I asked, annoyed. I closed my eyes for a minute and they all bunked off?

“I hope you didn’t really expect them to stay whilst you napped,” he replied, looking back down at his screen but his tone betrayed his amusement.

“I didn’t nap, I was just—“

“Resting your eyes?” he rolled his own. “You really ought to leave your problems at home, rather than bring them to the workplace. Utterly unprofessional of you.” He wasn’t reprimanding. He was enjoying this.

“My home _is_ the problem,” I admitted grumpily.

He paused in his typing and glanced up. “Landlord troubles?”

I shook my head and sat up in my seat, turning my neck either side to get the crick out of it from slumping in my apparent slumber. “No, just a few things need fixing up. But it’s hardly worth the money, it’ll cost more in repairs than the bloody flat’s worth.”

“I told you, there’s a flat free on Baker Street. I really can have a word with the landlady, if you want.” He kept his tone impassive but I had a suspicion that being generous and helpful wasn’t one of his usual characteristics. I wondered why he was offering me a hand.

“I couldn’t possibly afford a flat like yours,” I laughed sardonically. 

He pressed his lips together in a smile. “I’ll have a word with the landlady,” he reaffirmed, his words full of a promise that I didn’t quite get yet.

//

After my final seminar of the day, I packed up my things and headed off campus before I bumped into Mary. I wasn’t purposely avoiding her, but I really didn’t feel like speaking to her today. In fact, I hadn’t spoken to her at all since our date, if you could call it that. I felt like I was probably being rude, in case she was expecting me to call. I just hadn’t felt like I was fully into whatever it was that we were doing.

I hopped on the tube and had been seated for about two stops before my phone buzzed in my pocket. It only vibrated once, signalling a text, so even if it was Mary I could tactfully avoid replying until later. I slid it out of my pocket and punched my pass code in.

_Baker Street. My landlady would like to meet you. SH_

I wondered how the bloody hell he’d got my number, but then I settled on the fact that I probably didn’t want to know. He was probably hacking the university computer system whilst I took my impromptu seminar nap. I sighed and made to reply.

_I’m getting some lunch. I have marking to do._

I hit ‘send’ and felt a tiny bit guilty in case his landlady felt rebuked by my rejection; perhaps he’d managed to really get her to do a favour for me. I didn’t have to sit in my guilt for long.

_There is a café here. Bring your marking. She wants to meet you. SH_

_I don’t just drop everything for you, you know._

Despite my reply, I found myself getting off the tube at Baker Street regardless and heading overground grumpily. I made my way to Speedy’s Café in a surprisingly familiar manner, almost as though I’d been coming here for years.

He was waiting outside with a cardboard cup of coffee in his hands, steam rising in lazy swirls around his face. His eyes flickered over to me and he watched me every second as I crossed the road.

“I thought you didn’t just drop everything for me,” he commented, sipping his coffee with a smirk on the side of his mouth.

“I was hungry,” I grumbled, eyeing the café behind him.

“Very well. Shall we?” He gestured towards the tiny door to the vicinity and I slipped inside wordlessly, sliding into one of the booths and he slid in opposite me. His long legs caused our knees to touch under the table, but neither of us made an effort to move. There was something comforting about physical contact with someone. This was the kind of contact no one could see, either.

I ordered some soup and tried to ignore the disapproving hum threatening to erupt from my throat when Sherlock didn’t order anything. It wasn’t unusual for a teenager in university to be on a crap diet, but not even I could have survived off black coffee alone.

“She’s very excited to meet you,” he muttered to me; his voice read as annoyance but there was a certain fondness behind his words. 

“Does your landlady know I’m… Ah, well, your teacher?”

Sherlock was already sliding back out of the booth, bumping our knees together, before I’d settled my spoon back in my empty bowl. “Irrelevant details, really. Come. She will be expecting us.”

I felt a tiny bit guilty about even coming, because I knew I would have to refuse her offer regardless. There was just no way I could afford a flat like Sherlock’s, especially in such a nice area. I sighed longingly as we entered the door marked 221B. 

I rubbed my feet on the doormat in the hallway as the door to the right of the stairway opened and a short, smiling woman dressed in plum shuffled out, beaming up at Sherlock. He surprised me by placing his hands on her shoulders and planting a kiss on her cheek.

“Mrs. Hudson,” he began, turning slightly in my direction and gesturing with his hand. “This is Doctor John Watson.”

Mrs. Hudson stepped over to me with a kind smile on her face, as though she’d known me her whole life and I’d always been her tenant. “Oh, Doctor Watson, Sherlock’s been telling me all about you and your flat troubles. There’s a lovely room upstairs, just big enough for you, I reckon, can’t imagine you’ve got that many belongings—“

I caught Sherlock’s eye at tuned out the woman’s ramblings. She was very sweet but even I could tell that Sherlock found her incessant. It warmed me slightly inside that there was at least one person in the world that Sherlock felt some fondness towards.

Mrs. Hudson made her way to the stairs before pausing and eyeing the door leading downstairs. “There is a room downstairs which I’ve tried hard to shift, there’s mould and damp which makes it a hard sell… Shouldn’t take too much to fix up, I’ve got a few numbers in my address book; lovely young boys, do a smashing job for half the price of the ones in the directory. Oh! But I suppose you wouldn’t want to fuss with all that would you, Doctor Watson?”

“Please, call me John,” I smiled warmly. Indeed, the downstairs flat didn’t seem all that appealing. It felt like damp and mould followed me everywhere. Perhaps that told me something about myself. 

“Well, there’s a small bedroom upstairs, just above Sherlock. Of course, it’s just a bedroom on its own, but I’m sure Sherlock wouldn’t mind you popping in to use the kitchen or the bathroom. There’s a double bed and a wardrobe and I think the last tenant left some coat hangers, so I won’t charge you for them!” She chuckled at her own joke and made her way upstairs, chattering happily to herself like an old mother.

Sherlock turned to me then, assessing my reaction. “I would advise taking the room upstairs. Far cheaper just to rent a bedroom. You won’t find a cheaper price for anywhere decent in London.”

“Sherlock, we’d… We’d practically _live_ together.” I wasn’t even entirely sure whether this would be against my codes of practice. Was it illegal to just coincidentally move into the same set of flats as one of your students? Surely sharing a landlady wouldn’t be breaking the law?

He grinned at me then, a playful glint in his eye that made me automatically smile back. He looked like a child in the face of a new toy. “Won’t that be such fun?”

Something in his tone suggested that the deal was already done and once I’d seen the bedroom and Mrs. Hudson had given me a rental offer that nearly knocked me off my feet, I couldn’t object. I packed my things that evening and looked forward to moving into Baker Street with Sherlock Holmes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have a feeling things are about to get a little bit more interesting around 221B.


	7. Reckless

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He turned to me again before announcing to the room: “Plus, where is the fun in doing what is conventional, anyway?”

The first morning I awoke in Baker Street was a fairly bright, cheery Saturday. I sprawled out in my double bed, eyes still closed but a small smile playing on my face. When I finally ventured to open my eyes, I looked around the room and took in my surroundings - the wardrobe, the chest of drawers, my coats hung on the back of the door. All of my things in a foreign place that didn’t really feel all that foreign.

No damp on the ceiling. No nasty chill about the room. I could smell eggs and toast wafting under the crack in the door from downstairs. It smelt like home. I hadn’t felt like I was really home for a very long time.

I crept downstairs, clothes folded over my arm and snuck to the bathroom to shower before anyone saw me. For some reason, I was unusually cautious about anyone seeing me in the morning before I was ready - namely, Sherlock Holmes.

I emerged from the bathroom in a puff of steam, ensuring I left everything in the bathroom exactly how I found it. I wanted to scuttle back to my bedroom and avoid any conversation with my student - God, did that pain me to remember - but the growling from my stomach gave me away halfway to the stairs, when Mrs. Hudson popped her head around the door to Sherlock’s flat.

“Oh, John, dear, I’ve made some breakfast, do join us,” her voice was motherly and caring and I couldn’t possibly refuse. I nodded with an appreciative, somewhat apprehensive smile. 

Sherlock’s flat was as messy as the time I had first called here and I hadn’t noticed before, but the majority of items sitting on shelves and surfaces were surrounded by coats of dust. Did this man never clean?

Mrs. Hudson gestured to the table and I slid in opposite him; he didn’t look up from his Blackberry even when I poured myself some tea from the pot. He was wrapped in a silky-looking dressing gown, looking so simultaneously bored and intrigued that it was almost a paradox. 

Mrs. Hudson shuffled back from the kitchen holding a plate of eggs and another plate of toast, setting them before me gently. “Now, I must remind you, as Sherlock seems to forget,” she punctuated this point by jabbing his shoulder with her finger and she received a grunt and a roll of the eyes in response. “I am not your housekeeper. I don’t mind if you call on me now and then, but I am your _landlady_ , I’m not here to be your slave.” I nodded politely at her and she patted my shoulder, waiting for confirmation from Sherlock that he understood her point. Getting nothing, she turned with an irritated “Oh!” and plodded downstairs back to her flat.

I ate my eggs in silence and cringed internally at how loud I crunched my toast. Had I always been such a loud eater? Maybe I’d end up getting on his nerves. Why couldn’t I just eat my toast in my own room, where I didn’t feel so intimidated?

Sherlock eventually set his phone down on the table and blinked at me a few times, like he hadn’t even registered my presence until now. He took a long sip of his coffee and didn’t break eye contact with me over his mug. It was slightly unnerving.

“Sleep well?” he enquired, setting his mug down and leaning back in his chair. He hadn’t touched the toast on his plate.

I nodded and swallowed my mouthful of food. “Oh, yeah. Great, thanks.”

He nodded too and assessed me with his eyes, which made me even more uncomfortable. Did everyone always feel like they were under constant scrutiny around him?

“You’re nervous,” he observed, his casual tone betraying nothing. He said it as simply as if he’d told me my shirt was red. “Tell me why.”

I floundered for a minute, not even sure how to begin to explain. I wished he could just deduce it all from me. I wasn’t even entirely sure what it was that scattered my brains so much. I settled for the easily dismissible answer. “I’m just not sure how to explain this living arrangement to people at work.”

“Why should you need to explain anything to them? What business is it of theirs?”

I shrugged. “Yeah, but that’s what people do, isn’t it? Ask interested questions. They will want to know about where I’ve moved to.”

“Well, tell those _people_ ,” he sneered the word. “To keep their intrusive questions to themselves.”

“It isn’t exactly conventional to be living with your student,” I muttered.

“You’re not living with me,” he replied coolly. “You live upstairs. You were invited for breakfast. We do not live together.” With that, he stood and left his dishes exactly where they were on the table, padding into the living room. He turned to me again before announcing to the room: “Plus, where is the fun in doing what is conventional, anyway?” Then he plonked himself on the leather sofa and assumed his impenetrable thinking position, leaving me reeling.

//

I was nervous about going to work when I got up on Monday morning; it felt as though every faculty member would be able to smell Sherlock’s home scent on me and they’d know everything.

I had to keep reminding myself that nothing had even happened.

I left uncharacteristically early, just to avoid having to make the journey to the campus with Sherlock. He could probably sense that I was avoiding him, but the more distance I put between us, the better.

Even just over the course of the last weekend, I had felt as though we were on the edge of some precipice that I definitely did not want to topple over. Casual brushes in the corridor when shuffling to or from the bathroom; lingering stares, usually from Sherlock, but he was renowned for being intrusive; it felt almost criminal that I was able to see him in his pyjamas in the morning, curls still mussed from tossing and turning in bed. It worried me that I knew how much - or, generally, little - sleep he had had the night before.

It made my palms sweat and the back of my neck itch. I wanted to peel off my skin and reveal the real John Watson, the John Watson that was self-assured and confident and wouldn’t be terrified to tell the egocentric, obtuse git to piss off.

It shouldn’t have surprised me that he cornered me in my classroom as soon as I set my last class free. It had been a half-hearted slide show that nobody paid attention to. I wanted to feel guilty that these kids were in thousands of pounds of debt in order to be here and to learn, but at the moment, I just wanted them to leave me alone.

“Have I… Offended you?” he ventured, the words sounding unsure on his tongue. Nothing ever sounded unsure coming from the mouth of Sherlock Holmes.

I looked up from my desk, mouth suddenly dry. He’d just come in from the rain and drops were settled delicately on the top of his head, glinting under the lights. It was like he had thousands of tiny diamonds in his inky curls. I blinked several times. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“John, you haven’t done anything wrong…” he was tentative, stepping towards my desk the same way one might approach a frightened animal. “I don’t know why you are so uncomfortable.”

“Sherlock, I just think it’s best if we—”

He waved his hand dismissively. “Yes, yes, don’t see each other, don’t interact. Whatever. I just fail to… Understand, exactly, why you let the opinions of other people bother you so.”

He didn’t like not understanding, that much I could tell. He stopped on the other side of my desk, the tips of his leather gloves touching the faux wood. He looked at me earnestly. He wanted me to help him understand. “It’s not that, I just—”

Before I could finish, he slipped around my desk and stood in front of me, so close that my knees were in contact with his shins and he was looking down at me, his hands braced either side of my head on the back of my chair, boxing me in. I had a dizzying sense of déjà vu.

“I don’t think you’re afraid as you make yourself out to be,” his voice was low now, an almost threatening hum, his words coming so fast I had to consciously force myself to keep up. “I can see it in your eyes. I can practically smell it from you. You like danger. You’ve always wanted risk. You crave it - why else would you wish to be an army doctor? Lives in your hands, people under your control. You’re worried about people’s opinions, yes, but why? You don’t want them to know that underneath your cable knit jumpers and long-forgotten dreams you still wish you could do something reckless and that it _scares_ you to be living such a mundane life.”

Sherlock’s breathing was slightly faster now, his face inches from mine, so I could feel every huff of breath against my face. I wanted to push him away and get my own space, my own oxygen and fill it with my own carbon dioxide. But something kept me still and I couldn’t stop staring at his mouth so close to mine; that clever mouth, that irritating, blunt mouth.

“Tell me none of that’s true and I’ll leave you alone,” he whispered.

I couldn’t and he knew it.

I could see it happen before it actually did - a slow-motion movie capture; him leaning towards me and pressing that full bottom lip to mine, enveloping my mouth, tasting like cigarettes and spice and adrenaline. 

The knock at the door pulled me back to the present and my eyes focused, my lips devoid of any contact. I licked them to be sure, but they tasted of nothing.

Sherlock groaned - a sound which tap-danced inappropriately to my groin, without my permission - and straightened up, taking a few long strides back and nodding stiffly at Mary as she peeked around the door.

“Oh! Sorry, sorry, I didn’t realise you were busy,” she squeaked, eyeing me with suspicion and Sherlock with awe. 

Sherlock’s eyes narrowed as he buried his hands deep into the pockets of his Belstaff. “Not at all, I was just leaving,” he announced bluntly and stepped around Mary, slipping out of the classroom, probably back home to sulk. I felt like sulking myself as I rolled my chair further under my desk, attempting to hide the inconvenient beginnings of an erection stirring in my trousers from a fast-approaching Mary Morstan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hate this chapter and I am so sorry. Writer's block and a terribly ugly inner critic have got the better of me. Sorry it has been so long, but exams are life-consuming. Please forgive me. Also, please forgive me for the kiss-that-never-was. 
> 
> If you want to send me hate and death threats, please take it to tumblr: http://hijawn.tumblr.com (shameless plug. Bite me) (Also I am laughing because I typed that as "death treats" at first. Death treats are welcome too)


	8. Rumours

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “And what do you think?” he asked softly.
> 
> “I haven’t got a clue about you,” I answered honestly.

“That looked intense,” Mary sniggered, stepping inside. I smiled and nodded to appease her, shrugging casually at the same time.

“Well, that’s Sherlock.”

She giggled and peered over her shoulder before huddling over me conspiratorially. “I think he has a crush on you.”

I nearly choked on my own tongue. “What?”

She grinned at me and raised her eyebrows. “Yeah. Rumour going round that he… You know, bats for the other side, so to speak,” She reinforced this by pretending to hit a baseball out of the park. Annoyance stirred in my gut.

“And? Who cares?” I retorted. “It doesn’t matter what or who he likes. It’s all fine.”

Mary raised her arms defensively and backed away. “Alright, moody.” She began retreating back into the corridor but I didn’t have enough energy to feel remorse for snapping at her. It really was no concern of anyone’s whether or not Sherlock liked… Anyone. “Just saying, though - be careful with that one. He looks like the type to follow you home,” she said humourlessly, before flouncing out of the door. I wanted to simultaneously laugh and cry at the irony of her words.

//

Mary’s words didn’t leave me for the rest of the day; not the being gay part, or whatever the hell Sherlock Holmes was, but the ‘crush’. I didn’t think he was even capable of feeling anything towards another human being. His sterile and aloof manner pushed everybody away and it seemed that was the way he preferred things to be.

I mulled over everything I knew about Sherlock Holmes on the tube ride home and realised that I barely knew anything about him at all. I admittedly had sneakily read some of his file on the school system, but there wasn’t much there. Anything interesting about him was locked up in his own brilliant mind.

I trundled up the steps of the Baker Street underground and rounded the corner, Speedy’s Café welcoming me with its red sign and shutters slowly rattling shut. Mrs. Hudson waved to me from outside as I let myself in the shiny black door, whose knocker was always askew but I felt I was still too new there to straighten it.

Sherlock was already home, of course, as notes from a violin filtered down the staircase and made me smile momentarily. I could hear him pacing in his flat above me. It took me all the twelve steps upwards to realise that the music wasn’t coming from an iPod or the radio, but that it was actually Sherlock playing.

Unable to resist, I paused on the landing and spied through the crack in the door; Sherlock was already in his pyjamas and dressing gown, despite it being barely past five, bare foot and stepping around the living room in time to his own melody. His chin was pressed delicately to his instrument and his eyes were closed, but the movement of his fingers and the bow seemed so effortless.

Although I wasn’t very clued up on classical music, I had never heard this particular piece before. I was surprised by how much I enjoyed the violin’s sound and wondered why I had never thought to take an interest before.

Shifting my weight, my foot accidentally knocked a loose floorboard, which alerted him to my presence. I froze, embarrassed, as he paused in his playing and padded over to the door, pulling it open and eyeing me suspiciously.

“Am I bothering you?” he asked coolly.

I swallowed and screwed my face up. “What? Oh, no, no, I was just on my way upstairs—”

“And you thought you would spy on me instead.”

There it was - I physically felt my ears and cheeks redden. “I wasn’t _spying_ , I just… I didn’t know you played the violin.”

He nodded obviously. “Yes. It helps me think. I suppose I should have disclosed such information before we moved you in. Potential flat mates should know the worst about each other, don’t you think?”

“I’m not saying it’s a flaw, I just didn’t know. You’re very good. Brilliant, in fact.”

I thought I saw his face alter ever so slightly and he looked pleased at my compliment. It reminded me of when he had deduced me for the first time in that pub, all that time ago and I had fearlessly gushed about how brilliant and fantastic he was. I thought someone as arrogant as him would be used to praise.

He nodded in a sort of non-verbal thanks and stepped back inside, resting the violin against his shoulder once more. He left the door open and I wasn’t entirely sure whether it was an invitation, but I took it anyway. It seemed I was leaving my inhibitions further and further behind with Sherlock Holmes.

I settled in one of the two armchairs by the fire - the leather one to the right was so obviously _his_ chair that I didn’t dare touch it. I adjusted the Union Jack pillow to give my back support. It felt like I had always been here, in this old red chair, with my brilliant flat mate waltzing to his own violin.

I closed my eyes and leaned my head back against the chair, allowing the music to envelop me. There was much to be said about music that didn’t have lyrics; you weren’t forced to think or feel anything. You thought and felt exactly what you wanted. 

It should have frightened me, or concerned me at the very least, that my every thought at that moment was about Sherlock, with Mary’s earlier words scattering around the confines of my brain. I didn’t know what these feelings were, or how to put a name to them. I hated being with him, but I hated being apart. He was rude and arrogant and inconsiderate, but he was brilliant and intelligent and enigmatic too. 

He didn’t like anyone, so why the hell would he like me? I was over fifteen years his senior. I was average in every sense of the word. I wasn’t even gay.

I opened my eyes and my brain finally caught up with the fact that the music had stopped and Sherlock was now sitting across from me, violin and bow abandoned, fingers steepled against his lips and watching me intently. I remembered a time when such a look would unnerve me. Now, I allowed him to look and deduce what he would. 

“Why don’t you have a girlfriend, John?”

I frowned. “Why do you ask?”

“Unfortunately, my keen eye for detail does not come with a telepathic function. I am simply enquiring.”

I shrugged uneasily. “Nobody’s interested, I suppose.” It was sad, but true.

As if reading my mind after all, Sherlock chipped in: “Mary Morstan likes you. Why isn’t she your girlfriend?”

I laughed a little. “How on earth would you know that?”

“Why else would someone go out of their way to pay you a visit between classes?”

I didn’t reply as I let his comment sink in. Was I completely imagining that other meaning? Sherlock frequently managed to pin me down - not literally, of course. Well, not usually - before classes, after lectures, in between seminars. Was he talking strictly about Mary or was he including himself in that bracket? I felt nauseous.

I cleared my throat. “Good question.”

“More so, if you didn’t like them, why would you allow yourself to be so available? One might deduce that you enjoyed their visits, so you sit around and wait for them to happen.”

He had leant forward in his chair now, still eyeing me as though he wanted to climb right into my irises and down into my soul. I kept getting distracted by the keen way his mouth talked and how words looked when he formed them on his lips. He was also wearing a v-necked pyjama shirt that displayed his collarbones like a work of art. Every inch of him was distracting and, not to mention, completely out-of-bounds.

“What did Mary say to you today, John?” his voice was lower now, almost excited.

I couldn’t stop looking at his mouth, especially when his tongue darted out over his bottom lip to moisten it. My tongue mirrored his action before looking up at his face to speak. “What? Er, I don’t know, just an anatomy question…”

“Terrible liar. She was talking about me. What did she say?”

“I, er, she wasn’t—”

“John, I already know what she said. I purposely started that rumour so that it would get back to you. But I need you to repeat it to me now.” Since when was his voice like that? Since when did I enjoy being given instructions? Since when did I just blurt out the truth when Sherlock Holmes asked me to?

“She said she thinks you… You’re… That you like, er, boys, or whatever.” He nodded, encouraging me to continue. “And that… Maybe you like— Like me.”

He paused and breathed calmly, never taking his eyes off me. “And what do you think?” he asked softly.

“I haven’t got a clue about you,” I answered honestly.

His eyes creased at the corners in a true, genuine smile at that. I committed that image to memory forever. His face slowly regained its composure and he slid off the chair to kneel before me, every man and woman’s wet dream right there. I wanted to actually groan. What the hell was he doing?

“Nobody does. Nor do I, truthfully.” 

He leaned forward and placed his hands on my knees for balance, his eyes flickering up to mine, looking for signs of disapproval. Upon receiving none, he slid his magnificent hands up to my thighs, pressing his weight onto his hands, his pale skin contrasted by my black work trousers. Using my legs as support, he lifted himself up to meet my face and leaned in, my heart pounding the entire time.

It was like earlier in the classroom, slow-motion and blurry and frightening. I was frightened about why the hell I was letting this happen and why I was more excited than embarrassed to kiss a boy. I was frightened about the implications kissing my student might have. Most of all, I was frightened about how I was going to feel afterwards.

Sensing my hesitation, he paused and looked at me warmly, an expression seldom found on the face of Sherlock Holmes. I swallowed and licked my lips unconsciously, staring at him with what I assume was bewilderment and pure fear. My tongue darting out of my mouth must have reminded him of his mission, as he finally closed the agonising gap between us and pressed his mouth against mine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so, I know I'm terrible and awful for ending it there. I considered carrying on but decided I wanted to dedicate a whole chapter to the magic of that first kiss, because basically I suck and I feel like writing some sickening fluff. So hold on to your butts, because it's coming.  
> (I love you all so much I'm so sorry ps plugging tumblr right about now http://hijawn.tumblr.com bye)


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